Getting to Know You
by vikatenista
Summary: A post-Thanksgiving L&O: CI marathon led to this piece. In the early months of their partnership, Mike Logan came to realize he didn't know much about Carolyn Barek at all. That is, until one fateful night in the squad room, when he learned more about her than he ever could've bargained for. ML/CB friendship, T to be safe for themes.


_A/N: Having spent eight hours on the day after Thanksgiving watching Law and Order: CI reruns, I got inspired to write this little short piece on the partnership of Logan and Barek. I always liked Barek's character and felt like she was shrouded in mystery in her short time with us, so I decided to make her a little rounder than she appeared on the show. Reviews are appreciated and happy holidays!_

As the holiday season approached, Detective Mike Logan found himself just as enthralled by Carolyn Barek as he was when they first met, but their close proximity to each other in recent weeks had done little to answer many of his lingering questions about his new partner.

The enigmatic polyglot from Brooklyn would be the one by his side as he began his second chance in the NYPD at Major Case, and it often hit Logan just how little he knew about her. He kept his thoughts to himself, but they were more apparent on Tuesday nights such as this one; the duo had been working late into the night on their most recent case for the past two weeks, trying to catch a break — any break, and hardly exchanged words for hours at a time. Logan lost track of the amount of time they'd been working, and stifled a yawn as he looked up and across at his partner, who was reaching for her vibrating cell phone.

"Give me a sec," she said as she rose from her desk and felt his eyes on her. "I've gotta take this."

Barek walked down the hall of the squad room, but Logan could still hear enough of his partner's conversation to discern that she'd received a call from her mother, whom he knew to be very Catholic, and very strict — at least in Barek's youth. After a few short sentences, however, he heard his partner's tone change — and a lightness crept into her voice that he'd never heard before.

 _"Hi baby! How was school? A 100 on your math test? I'm so proud of you, mijita. Listen, I have to go back to work — mama loves you very much, okay? I'll see you in the morning. I promise."_

Logan heard his partner's heels clicking on the floor as she returned to the main area of the squad room, and mused for a moment before he spoke to her plainly.

"You never told me that you have a kid."

"The captain knows, and _you_ never gave me reason to…" Barek said casually, and trailed off, as she sat back down at her desk and dropped her phone into her coat pocket.

After a beat, she added, "Remember that boyfriend I told you about?"

"The one with the gambling problem?"

"The one that I wasted two years on? Trying to help him before I realized he didn't want to help himself? Yeah, him. Near the end of that two years, he got angry, and I got pregnant — and I sure as hell wasn't going to let him take Ari and me down with him."

"Ari?"

"Her name is Ariana," Barek smiled. "She's seven. She loves puppies, coloring inside the lines, and I just signed her up for soccer."

Barek turned in her chair, rifled around her coat pocket for her cell phone, and tossed it over to him across her desk. Logan grabbed it, pressing the home button to reveal a photo of his partner with her arms wrapped around a little girl's shoulders in front of their Christmas tree. The pair smiled brightly, and Barek looked happier than he'd ever seen her in their short time together.

"Good work, Carolyn. Dark hair, dark eyes — she…looks just like you."

"And thank God for that."

"Not a fan of the ex, even after all these years?" Logan quipped, but it quickly hit him that he shouldn't have. "Jesus, I'm sor—

"It's…not that," she said, cutting him off. "Well, okay. It's sort of that. It….took me a while."

"I'm not sure I follow."

Barek sighed, and ran her fingers through her hair as she set the case file she'd been briefly perusing down on her desk.

"I'd be lying if I said she was planned. I had just gotten my shield, and I'd done a pretty good job of keeping everybody in the dark about the shit storm that was my personal life. With everything going on with Lucas at that time, I panicked. It was the first time in my life I felt unsure about anything. I thought about…"

She didn't have to finish the thought for Logan to draw conclusions.

"I…I made the appointment at the clinic," she continued. "I drove there alone, even though they tell you not to. There was no way I was going to tell my mother — but there I was, Carolyn Barek — Kathleen Barek's, the rectory receptionist's, the Sunday school teacher's daughter — getting an abortion.

"…But I couldn't do it. I got to the door and I…I don't know what it was; I just couldn't. I ran off."

"Carolyn, I…" Logan was at a loss for words. "Do you want to go on?"

"I left Lucas and moved back home with my parents in Cobble Hill. I worked — probably overworked — myself during the pregnancy, and I think it was more to distance myself from what was happening to me and what I was feeling. For nine months, I kept thinking, 'What if?', you know? 'What if I can't do this?' 'What if he wants back in my life?' 'What if my kid looks like him?' I hated myself for it.

"My labor and delivery was complicated, but when she was born and I held her for the first time, I cried. Tears of joy, obviously, and relief that she was okay, yeah. But…guilt, too. For feeling all the things I felt, I think. It was overwhelming. I don't know how I could've ever thought of looking at my child and be worried that I wouldn't be able to love her. I haven't really figured those feelings out, even after all this time. But I love that little girl. I love her with my entire being, my entire soul. And everything I do, I do for her. When I worked for the FBI in Washington after 9/11, we lived with my sister, but I was away from Ari so much. I loved my work there, and thought we were doing great things, but I couldn't stand being away from her for weeks at a time. When the time came for her to start school, I felt it was best for us to move back to New York and for me to get back on the force."

At that point, Barek got up from her desk and strided over to the water cooler, as Logan let all of her words sink in. She returned a short time late with a cup of water in hand, and spun around in her chair to face Logan.

"You going to stare at me for the rest of the night?" she chuckled drly. "Not sure we're going to make a hell of a lot of progress on this case that way, Logan."

"I'm just...surprised is all," he finally said. "How come you never told me any of this earlier?"

"I'm telling you _now_ ," she mocked. "Jokes aside, it takes me a little while to open up to people, Logan. It's been a long road for me and I don't get easily attached. We've only been partners for a couple of months, you know. This night aside, I'd expect you to at least know my favorite color at this point."

Logan went quiet again; his eyes glued to the floor.

Barek sighed, rolling her eyes playfully. "...It's purple."

"Good to know," Logan chuckled. "Hey, listen. You wanna order some food? I'm not sure I can go through any more paperwork without eating it."

"Put some salt on it first," she said, her lips curling into a smile. "I'm starving, actually."

"Is Chinese okay?" he asked, as he dug through his desk trying to find a takeout menu. "I'd kill for some orange chicken."

"Orange chicken?" she repeated. "That's my favorite, too. Damn, Logan — I hope you're taking notes. There will be a quiz on all my big reveals tonight."

Logan shook his head, smiling as he picked up the receiver and dialed the phone number of the squad's favorite Chinese takeout place a few blocks away.

As he suspected all along, there was a lot more to Carolyn Barek than meets the eye.


End file.
